Category Archives: Crazy World of Politics

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As I was reading about how radio host Tim Farley, of “The Morning Briefing with Tim Farley” radio program, immediately cut off Retired Air Force Colonel Dick Brauer, Jr. after he started spewing the wingnut lie about how Obama is a Muslim, I just couldn’t help myself as I blurted out “it’s about damn time.” Someone finally took the microphone away and said he wasn’t going to let him start spouting his untruths.

The Republican’s obsession with trying to convince the American public that President Obama is a Muslim, is just nuts. The man has been elected president twice and not running for the presidency again. Why does it matter anyway.

For the first two hundred years of this country, most of our presidents worked diligently to keep their religious lives private and to keep some sort of wall between their religion and their Presidency. Two of our most famous Presidents, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln, were unaffiliated with any religion.

Even though he is considered one of our greatest presidents, Abraham Lincoln probably would not be nominated, much less elected today because he never joined a church, never publicly confessed a creed, nor publicly uttered belief in God’s endorsement of his policies.

Andrew Jackson conscientiously refused to allow his religion to be a part of his office. Jackson was called on by members of Congress and influential religious leaders to call for a national day of prayer and fasting in response to a cholera epidemic. Jackson refused, stating that to do so would be to transcend “those limits which are prescribed by the Constitution for the President,” and he feared that this religious encroachment could “disturb the security which religion now enjoys in this country in its complete separation from the political concerns of the General Government.”

So, during my lifetime I have witnessed the Republicans hatred for President Obama because he might be a Muslim (and he is black); their animosity towards John F. Kennedy because he was a Catholic; and their loathing of Jimmy Carter who was a devout Southern Baptist Christian. Yet, they were more than willing to run Mitt Romney for president and he was a Mormon (nothing bad, just not one of their kind).

The Republicans were so fixated on John Kennedy’s Catholicism and the possibility that his religion (i.e. Pope) may influence his presidential decisions, they made it a national religious issue. To mitigate this Republican obsession with his Catholicism, on September 12, 1960, Kennedy delivered the speech of his political career in Houston, Texas, before a crowd of several hundred mostly Protestant ministers. Kennedy was addressing what he referred to as “the so-called religious issue.” As Kennedy saw it, the nation was facing a raft of issues from the threat of Soviet communism to hunger and despair at home. “These are,” he argued, “the real issues which should decide this campaign. And they are not religious issues—for war and hunger and ignorance and despair know no religious barrier.” Nonetheless, JFK knew he had to address the question of his Catholicism. Kennedy famously declared, “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute; where no Catholic prelate would tell the president—-should he be Catholic—how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote,” and he concluded, “I do not speak for my church on public matters; and the church does not speak for me.” Earlier in his career in Congress, JFK once quipped that in Boston they learned their politics at home and their religion from Rome. As JFK put it, “I believe in a president whose religious views are his own private affair, neither imposed by him upon the nation, or imposed by the nation upon him as a condition to holding that office.”

Now that was a great speech on keeping church and state separate.

Fast forward to today and we see that we have now done a 180º degree flip and the Republicans want exactly the opposite of what John Kennedy said. Now it is all about church influencing and guiding state policies and ministers telling their parishioners for whom they should vote. Do I see a Supreme Court decision in the future stating that keeping church and state separate is unconstitutional?

That is crazy you say. Think about it. Think about how politicized and radical the evangelicals have become in the last twenty years. Maybe not so crazy.

So, this week 47 Republican Senators signed a letter to Iran’s leaders warning that any nuclear deal with President Barack Obama could last only as long as he remains in office.

In the letter, the senators said Congress plays a role in ratifying international agreements. Noting Obama will leave office in January 2017, they said any deal not approved by Congress would be merely “an executive agreement” that could be revoked by Congress.

The letter also warned that any nuclear agreement could be reversed by by the next president “with a stroke of a pen.”

Iran immediately took the 47 Republicans that signed the letter tothewoodshed…

“In our view, this letter has no legal value and is mostly a propagandaploy,” Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, said in a statement.

“It is very interesting that while negotiations are still in progress and while no agreement has been reached, some political pressure groups are so afraid even of the prospect of an agreement that they resort to unconventional methods, unprecedented in diplomatic history.”

Iran’s Zarif continued to school the Republicans. “I wish to enlighten the authors that if the next administration revokes any agreement ‘with the stroke of a pen’ … it will have simply committed a blatant violation of international law,” he said in a statement.
I don’t think I know enough adjectives to describe how stupid and traitorous this seditious stunt by the Republicans is.

Of course the statement above is inaccurate considering Dubya was Selected, not Elected, the first time.

We all sat back and watched the fiasco in Florida that ultimately led to him being selected as President in 2000. While all the public attention was focused on hanging chads, butterfly ballots and a skewed recount, the root of the problem was overlooked. The state of Florida purged over 90,000 people from their list of eligible voters under the guise that they were felons. In fact, almost none of the disenfranchised voters were felons…but almost all were blacks or democrats. Remember, George Bush only won Florida by 537 votes. Of course, Jeb Bush’s Secretary of State Katherine Harris, also co-chair of Bush’s presidential campaign, was in charge of Florida’s vote count. After all, Jeb Bush did promise his brother he was going to deliver Florida.

Is America really that stupid? Yes.

If we can elect George W. Bush to a second term after everything he did, or didn’t do, then yes we are stupid enough to do it again.

Congress is now under total Republican control. It has been eight years since the last time this happened, and Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House John Boehner are ready to lead their new Republican majority Congress to new heights.

They can now get serious about passing legislation that benefits everyone, except the American people. Speaker of the House John Boehner has said that Republicans should be proud of “how many laws benefiting the people we eliminated.” He said Republicans just “don’t do all that nonsense” of passing laws for the people. “Unpopular? Yes. Why? Because we’re fighting for what we believe in.”

If we look at the first 200 bills proposed by the new Republican Congress, we know what they believe in:

Repealing ObamaCare

Deregulating everything

Stopping immigration

Cutting government spending via austerity

Holding the debt ceiling hostage

Being against anything the President is for

Rewarding their wealthy supporters.

There were no jobs bills; no economic bills; and definitely no environmental bills proposed. Sound familiar? Same old obsession with President Obama, deficits, debt, and women’s bodies. No consideration for the needs of the common, hard-working, American people.

In all fairness, the Republicans are trying to pass one “major” jobs bill; the Keystone XL oil pipeline. It is estimated that this “major” jobs bill will generate approximately fifty (50) long-term jobs. Of course the real beneficiaries of this bill are the Koch brothers and TransCanada, not the American people.

We should not be surprised. The Republicans are keeping their promises to their wealthy and powerful supporters. They will continue to reward the rich (1%) and the big corporations by taking away from the American people (99%).

Another example: By passing a rule banning the transfer of funds within the Social Security Trust, they are supporting the Koch brothers and Wall Street’s quest to gain access to American’s retirement accounts. Passing this rule will help create a Social Security crisis that could lead to privatizing Social Security.

By their actions during the first week in control of Congress, there is no doubt their priorities are to support their wealthy supporters and keep their promises to them. All at the expense of the common, hard-working, American people. Shameful.

Telling it as it is since 2013 - Living in Edinburgh, Scotland with my wonderful family and friends trying to live with Agoraphobia, Psychosis, M.E (Chronic Fatigue), PTSD and Fibromyalgia - "Life is Hard, don't make it worse" - Enjoy the Journey with me, follow me, and I will follow back. Thanks :-) Shauny

This site is about everything from my philosophy on life to the little things that make me laugh. IIt is about living, and breathing, and pausing long enough to take it all in. I hope it makes you laugh, sometimes makes you cry, but always makes you want to come back for another visit. It is your words, and your likes that inspire me to keep writing. And it is through my writing that you have a very large window to my soul. Relax awhile, read, and enjoy!